The defense of the former Figure of the Jet-Set, convicted with the United States of sexual trafficking, considered that one of the jurors was not partial to have been the victim of sexual abuse.
Le Monde with AFP
Ghislaine Maxwell, convicted at the end of 2021 in New York of minor sex trafficking on behalf of the deceased Financial Jeffrey Epstein, will not be rejected in a new trial as she claimed.
“The proposal of the accused for a new trial is rejected,” said April 1 April, Judge Alison Nathan of the Federal Court of Manhattan, according to a court order made public by the American justice.
The Ancient Figure of the International Jet-Set, 60, and his lawyers demanded a new trial since one of the jurors of the Federal Court of Manhattan who declared him guilty revealed to British media. even been a victim of sexual violence in his childhood.
“Explosive revelations”
After the trial, this 35-year-old man, Scotty David, had spoken to the press in January and recognized on March 8th in the New York justice forgot to mention, in his answers to a questionnaire to be sworn at the trial. , Having been sexually assaulted when he was a child., THIS MILET – Called “Juré 50” by Justice – had then admitted a “fault”, not a lie. But the defense of M me Maxwell believed that the jury could be suspected of bias in order to pronounce on sexual crimes against minor girls.
For the Manhattan court, “the juror 50 testified in a credible and sincere way during his hearing after the trial. He is unfortunate but not deliberate that he did not reveal the sexual assault he suffered In the past during the selection for the trial, “wrote Nathan J. in his order.
“The Tribunal concludes that the juror 50 had no prejudice to the accused and could be a fair and impartial jury,” according to the judicial document.
This judicial decision was not necessarily expected on Friday. But Nathan J. has been seized urgently at midday by Ghislaine Maxwell, Bobbi Sternheim, about the imminent broadcast of an “explosive” documentary.
The Ghislaine Partner in Crime Documentary Series, turned during and after the trial, must be broadcast these days on the Paramount + streaming platform. The Juror Scotty David is interviewed “in depth” and makes “explosive revelations”, according to the letter of the lawyer and a trailer of paramount.
The sentence known at the end of June
The defense of M me Maxwell therefore asked the Manhattan judge of “supervising any decision [on a possible new trial] before the court and the legal advice see the interview” in the documentary. Federal justice will have passed and rejected the request for a new Maxwell trial.
The British Girl of the Press Robert Maxwell – Death in 1991 – was convicted on December 29, five of the six counts that weighed on it, including the most serious, minor sex trafficking. on behalf of Jeffrey Epstein. The US financial, the powerful economic and political networks in the United States and abroad, was himself accused of rapes of girls but committed suicide in prison in August 2019, before his trial.
His companion and accomplice for 30 years, Ghislaine Maxwell – British, French and American – incurs dozens of prison years and will experience his sentence at a hearing on June 28th.